The period 1450-1700 saw the expansion of European seaborne reconnaissance of Africa, Asia, the Americas and Oceania, which would lead to long-distance European empires in these regions. It also witnessed changes in European knowledge-making practices that heralded what is often termed the Scientific Revolution. This conference will investigate the impact of European exploration and travel on the structures, contents and sources of authority of European knowledge c. 1450-1700. It seeks to explore connections between the making of knowledge and a broad range of intellectual, political, cultural, religious and mercantile encounters between Europe and the wider world. It aims to bring together scholars from different disciplines working on any aspect of European knowledge that included an extra-European dimension. Forms of knowledge under consideration include ethnology, natural history, botany, natural philosophy, geography, cartography, medicine and chronology.

Overarching questions  In what ways was European knowledge re-shaped by exploration, imperialism and colonialism?  To what extent did indigenous knowledge systems influence European ‘science’?  How did information about distant places circulate, and how was it changed by circulation?  What was the nature of the exchanges of information and expertise between travellers, missionaries, colonial administrators, indigenous informants, artisans, scholars, readers and other groups from different countries? What challenges did these exchanges pose for testimony and authority?  What was the impact of colonial rivalries on the ways in which information was interpreted, used and disseminated?

Proposals are welcomed for full panels and individual papers (25 mins). Individual submissions should comprise a paper title, abstract (up to 300 words) and brief CV (max. one page) emphasizing publications. For full panel proposals, please include an additional 300-word description of the panel itself. Submissions should be sent to the conference organizer, Dr Surekha Davies (Birkbeck, University of London) at s.davies@bbk.ac.uk, and to Prof. Ricardo Padrón (University of Virginia) at padron@virginia.edu by 31 July 2010. A selection of papers will be published as an edited collection.